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Mackerel Preserved

A preserved mackerel seasoned with salt, pepper, cloves, mace, nutmeg, vinegar, and optional oil or suet.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 8 ingredients
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Why it works: Clove and nutmeg match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 8,686 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Mackerel Preserved

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Clean the mackerel thoroughly.

  2. Boil or lightly fry them in oil.

  3. Remove the bones, heads, and skins from the fish.

Season and pack

  1. Rub the fish with the salt, black pepper, cloves, mace, and grated nutmeg.

  2. Pack the fish in layers into a stone jar, covering each layer with seasoning.

  3. Pour vinegar over the fish and, if storing long-term, add salad oil or melted suet on top.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Clove + nutmegtop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together8,686 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Mace + nutmegtop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,557 recipes

    Shared aroma: myristicin (spice, warm).

  3. Pepper + clovetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Clove + macetop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together8,400 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyleugenol (clove, spice).

  5. Pepper + nutmegtop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together13,015 recipes

    Shared aroma: 4'-methylacetophenone (bitter almond).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Mackerel
Forms the body of the dish, becoming firm and flaky once cooked and preserved.
Coarse sea salt
Draws out moisture and seasons the fish, helping to preserve it.
Vinegar
Adds acidity that helps preserve the fish and gives it a sharp, tangy flavour.
Salad oil or melted suet
Forms a fat layer over the fish that limits contact with air, helping it keep longer.

The step that matters

Pouring the vinegar over the fish. The vinegar must fully cover the fish so that its acidity reaches every piece. Exposed fish can spoil, since acid and a sealed layer of fat together slow microbial growth.

Swap the mace

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pepper, clove, nutmeg, vinegar):

  1. Allspicefits better
  2. Cinnamonfits better
  3. Cardamomfits better
  4. Macethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pepper, clove, nutmeg, vinegar. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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